


Heartbeats at Dawn

by thelogicoftaste



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Accidental Baby Acquisition, Alternate Universe, Dad!Tony, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/M, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2021-04-03 17:02:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21482350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelogicoftaste/pseuds/thelogicoftaste
Summary: Someway, somehow, Tony ends up with an armful of kid. He sees his face, distorted and pale-ish blue on the bevelled edge of the mirror above the electric fireplace, looking equal parts affronted and terrified. And he wonders, not for the first time today, how he got here.
Relationships: Pepper Potts/Tony Stark
Comments: 4
Kudos: 35





	Heartbeats at Dawn

**Author's Note:**

> In which Tony learns to be a dad, a partner, a friend, and... Tony.

As with all things, it starts with a crash. High-pitched, uncoordinated and wide, like soundwaves rolling over a crashing shore. It’s almost_—almost—_indistinguishable from Noddy Holder’s raspy declamations over the clamour of percussion. 

It startles Tony, foot slipping from his stool’s foothold and onto the wide-slabbed tiles of his workshop. He blinks, vision distorted behind his magnifying goggles, hands and tweezers poised over the careful deconstruction of Mark VII’s left gauntlet. 

“J.A.R.V.I.S.?” he ventures. The thumping bass in the workshop swoops down in volume. Tony moves a copper wire away from the square circuit board beneath it. “What was that?” 

From above, there’s the slightest, uncharacteristic moment of hesitancy. Then J.A.R.V.I.S. says, “I don’t know, sir.” 

“You-,” Tony pauses, glances up. “You don’t know?” 

“I’m uncertain as to what I am seeing,” he continues, lost in the clatter of Tony’s chair scraping back. He only barely remembers to drop the tweezers and take off his goggles. The music quietens quickly, until there’s solid silence permeating the workshop.

Dum-E whirrs to a stop too. He and U have been trying to fold a raggedy linen sheet for the past 15 minutes; he clacks his pincers, concerned.

Tony glances over them and then at the workshop—his tools are scattered between his two work desks, his sweater (cotton blend, pomegranate red, and approximately five thousand years old) lies destitute over U’s charging stand.

His suits are in their tubular casings around the perimeter of the room, behind clear glass panes and highlighted in a cool flush of LED white. Inactive like this, they’re a little eerie. It creeps out even Bruce, when he’s down here—their black, blank eyes, chins tucked to chest-plates and hands loosely curled at either side. But it settles something warm in Tony’s stomach; adrenaline, definitely, searing hot in his veins, but also the feeling of safety.

“How long until Pepper’s back?” he asks, turning to face Mark IV, a gleaming behemoth of terracotta red and gunmetal trimmings. It has a sleeker design, allowing for more agility, and yet, it’s trickier to handle, less powerful. 

“Miss Potts is still in the air, sir, with an ETA of three hours and seventeen minutes.” 

Tony lifts his arms and twitches his index and middle fingers. “Until JFK?” 

“No, sir,” J.A.R.V.I.S. replies as Mark IV’s compartment floods a cool-toned gold at the seams and slides open. “To the apartment.” 

Tony inhales, the gauntlet starts falling into place—piece by piece—over the wrinkled sleeve of his shirt. “Tell me what you know.”

“The disturbance is in the front sitting room, though there has been no structural damage to the area, intentional or otherwise,” J.A.R.V.I.S says. Tony hunches his shoulders and approaches the workshop’s doors. “There is also a child, sir.”

Tony falters, foot wobbly on the first of three wide slabs making up the staircase to the door. “A child?” 

“Seemingly.” The subtle emphasis doesn’t go amiss. “A toddler, from my approximations.”

“Don’t tell me it’s an alien,” Tony half-begs, resuming his steps. The workshop’s doors slide open with a familiar sound, like a breath of fresh air, clean and crisp. He can feel the difference in air quality as soon as he steps over the raised threshold. The staircase spirals around the thick shaft of the internal elevator, curling into the heavy shadows of not-quite morning. “Dear god—, how did it get _ in _ here?”

J.A.R.V.I.S.’ measured voice lowers in volume, a touch of an echo reverberating. “He simply appeared, from one moment to the next.”

“Meaning what?”

“Just as it is. He was not here, and then he was.” 

Tony frowns, leading the way with his gauntlet, the faint glow flushing over the wide-slabbed stairs. He climbs them slowly, back plastered to the wall, each leaden footstep entrenching unease deeper in his gut.

“What, so, like teleportation?” he asks quietly. “Like it shimmied in? Fell from the roof? Give me something to work with here, Jay.”

“That, I am afraid, I cannot tell you, sir,” J.A.R.V.I.S. replies. “I have isolated the frames—it clearly illustrates empty space in one, and the child in that very space in the next. Almost as if he—”

“Appeared between the frames?”

The friction between Tony's old, worn cotton shirt and the cool, white plastering creates little bursts of static noise, quiet in truth but excruciatingly loud in the face of the unknown.

He stops at the top of the stairs. If he tilts his head he can see the darkened area of the bar through the glass, though not much else. 

“Yes, sir,” J.A.R.V.I.S. continues into the quiet. “My shutter speed is remarkable. But, admittedly, there are moments when I do… blink.”

Tony flexes his fingers in the gauntlet, he can feel the pulse charge against his palm, like a wave cresting, simmering in anticipation. But he notes what J.A.R.V.I.S. said in the first instance: _ he—_a little boy in the middle of his apartment. A little boy who’d come in at precisely the moment the world’s most advanced being could not see. Almost as if he knew.

An irregular hiccoughing flutters out. It’s muffled, faint in the glass enclosure separating the stairs from the room. Tony approaches from the side. 

“Is he crying?”

“He’s no longer crying, sir,” says J.A.R.V.I.S. “This is little more than mild distress and theatrics, I should imagine.”

Tony's smirk tugs at the corner of his mouth, mutters, “Sounds familiar.” 

He darts his head around the corner—a flash of creamy ivory, textured purpling greys of dawn clouds, and the frazzled edge of Pepper’s favourite blanket. 

“Well, shit,” Tony breathes, back around the edge. 

“Sir?”

“Didn’t see anything,” he says, blood pulsing rabbit-fast in his veins. The silence that follows is pointed.

“On your left, sir." J.A.R.V.I.S. supplies. "The child is by the window.”

Tony gives him a distracted thumbs up with his free hand and peers around into the living room. It takes a moment for his vision to focus. Everything is just as it was, but there’s a small wiggling lump just beyond the giant, overstuffed couch. The one that Pepper loudly complains about each time she sees it (“It doesn’t match the decor,” she says sometimes. Or, “You found it behind a dumpster—a _ dumpster, _Anthony,” when she’s particularly irate) before she sinks into it with a sigh.

The kid is huddled on the floor, watching clouds float over Manhattan. Tony can only see his profile, his round cheeks, long lashes, and a flop of curly brown hair. He drags the back of his hand over his face, smearing god knows what all over the place, before grabbing a handful of his hair. He hiccoughs, small shoulders hunching with a shallow sigh, and watches the clouds some more.

Retreating back around the wall, Tony breathes deep. He looks at the wall opposite him, and its gleaming white nothingness. 

“The frames?” he asks. 

A line of small, long octagons illuminate some ten inches across the wall. They glow silvery blue and pulsate. Then, the light pitches forward, out into the real space, and, worn down by its own weight, it falls down to sink into the row below, duplicating itself. It does it again and then again and again, like a tumbling shower of a grid unfurling itself. In the end, it glows to an even opacity to replay the two frames. 

There is almost nothing distinguishable about each, taken in fractions of a nanosecond. But there, clear as day, is an empty frame and then: the kid. Tony can’t even make himself understand what’s happening. He shivers, niggling uncanniness that tickles at the nape of his neck. The kid isn’t there and then he is. He isn’t. And then he is.

Tony hums, pulling back the corner of his mouth as far as it goes. “Trippy.”

-

The doors separating the way to the workshop and the sitting room opens with a purposeful hiss of air. By the window, the kid startles, twisting around wide-eyed.

He has a hand still shoved in his tangled curls, forgotten teardrops beneath his eyes. He blinks twice and exhales, shoulders loosening.

Tony walks in carefully, watching the kid like a ticking time bomb. He stops after the two stairs down into the living room proper, socks bumping up against the rough woven edge of the rug beneath the Bösendorfer. “You missed the daycare centre by about three miles west, buddy.”

Two small, wispy brows bunch together. 

“There’s also a play centre on the 37th floor, if you’re in a hurry.” Tony says this mostly to distract himself from the vision in front of him. 

He’s so small, with tiny twitching fingers, and short legs curled up under him. Tony notices, hysterically, that the kid is no bigger than the bubinga étagère over by the side. 

His gauntlet feels altogether too heavy, weighing down his arm. His fingers curl self-consciously. He really hopes he can skip the trauma of shooting a child today. 

The kid swallows, turning more on his waist. He has a fuzzy Elmo on his shirt, wool threads mimicking its fur in a bright, electric blue.

“Uh,” Tony says, because that’s weird, right? 

The kid blinks at him, mouth slipping open, and he says, “Daddy,” in a voice that curls over itself. “It’s hurting.” 

Tony stares, freezes. Entire body going taught, like a statue, like a stone—like the giant stone-faced Buddha at Luoyang, that Pepper had gazed at transfixed, face screwed up against the sunlight beneath the visor of her (Tony’s) Dunkin’ Donuts hat—and, oh god, _ Pepper. _

“Daddy,” the kid says again, rough from crying. He proffers a short, chubby finger, flushed pink like his cheeks. “I’m hurting little bit.” 

It’s—, honestly it’s not the first time Tony has been called ‘daddy’ by people whom he has most definitely not fathered (an eight year old, by accident, in a classroom workshop in Missouri; Rhodey, aged nineteen, to be annoying; an early hook-up in Tony’s mid-twenties, _ not _ by accident or to be annoying). But the sincerity in the kid’s voice is sending panic spiking through him in ways those encounters did not. 

His head grows hot, until he can feel waves of blistering air rolling over his ears. He points aimlessly at his own chest, then moves it to circle around his face. “Do I loo-,” he stops, clears his throat. “Do I look like your daddy?”

The kid frowns, nods, and then shakes his head. He frowns again, confused, and waggles his hurt finger. “Is not funny,” he says, growing upset. 

He meets Tony’s eyes cleanly, with familiarity. Familiarity and, Tony narrows his eyes, _ expectation_—the kid looks affronted at the idea that Tony is not doing whatever the hell he expects him to do. It’s unnerving.

“Where are your parents?” Tony demands, tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth with every syllable. He feels parched. “What are you doing in my house, squirt?”

The kid looks away, out of the window, on to the tiles, to the gleaming oak bar.

“I’mma not a skirt,” he mutters to himself. He plants both palms on the floor, rearranges his feet underneath him and pushes himself up to standing, butt first.

His jeans bunch at his knees, a lighter wash of denim than its surrounding counterparts, in a way that comes only from wear and tear, not design. 

Once he’s gained full control of his balance, he places one sneakered foot in front of the other. 

“Stop,” Tony says as he advances, but there’s no heat to it. “No—I’m calling the police.” 

The kid does stop, a few paces away. It’s so abrupt that it puts Tony right back on the edge. The kid’s eyes narrow, like he’s seeing him for the first time, scrutinising him, furrow firmly between his brows. He picks at his blue Elmo sweater, scratches at his jeans and gazes at him—at his hair, his eyes, his beard (the kid presses his fingertips to his own cheeks in contemplation), and then to the gauntlet, still hanging with intent at the side.

A rough hiccough rocks him. 

“Need some water?” Tony asks into the awkward silence. He moves slightly, manoeuvring the gauntlet behind his back.

The kid nods, “Yeah, please some water.” 

“Right,” Tony says. He grabs a whisky tumbler from a tray on the bar and pours out some water from the tap hidden beneath the first level. 

It’s a decent size, with a heavy-bottomed crystal base and a sturdy rim. It fits neatly in Tony’s palm but looks enormous compared to the kid. He sways on his tiptoes to gain leverage, warm hands rising to rest gently against Tony’s, where he’s holding the glass steady for him.

The kid stares at the crystalline fragments at the bottom. He uncrosses his eyes to glance up at Tony beneath his lashes. 

The sound of chugging fills the space, the kid sucks more air than anything else. He catalogues Tony intently, eyes roving over his face. Tony too, gathers his data points.

He takes in the kid’s eyes—the colour of raw honey, framed by straight, dark lashes—the coppery tint to his brown hair and, as fingertips tap against his knuckles, the boy’s complete inability to stay still. 

Their eyes meet, curiosity on curiosity. It feels critical, these few moments of their gazes locked together. Like the step before something monumental. The kind of thing that Jarvis would term ‘overreacting’, Pepper would roll her eyes over, and Bruce—Bruce would squint at him for a long second and then breathe a careful, “okay.” But Tony knows what he’s talking about, alright?

The kid is the first to look away. He squirms, tilting his chin to get the last few dregs of water, and then he’s pushing Tony’s hand away. 

A monumental moment, maybe, but with nothing to show for it. 

-

Someway, somehow, Tony ends up with an armful of kid. He sees his face, distorted and pale-ish blue on the bevelled edge of the mirror above the electric fireplace, looking equal parts affronted and terrified. And he wonders, not for the first time today, how he got here.

The kid, for his part, looks completely at ease. He’s used chubby fingers to flick off any remainder of teardrops and has a casual arm hooked over Tony’s shoulder. He looks around the room with mild disinterest and breathes fast—faster than Tony is anyway—are children even supposed to breathe this fast? 

He can feel the kid’s stomach expanding and contracting against his ribs, soft bumps between two layers of shirts. He doesn’t seem concerned, but Tony-, Tony—

“Okay, you know what?” he says. “This is just too weird.” 

He pries the kid off of him and sets him on the ground. There’s a grunt of annoyance—classic—but the kid is more or less content to shuffle off. 

Tony wanders over to the bar, taking off the gauntlet and placing it on the counter. With the morning light peeking through the clouds, ever brighter, he can just about see lumping shapes that suggest things—good things, things that’ll make him feel better. 

The whisky decanter is squat and wide, and formed like a teardrop, with gentle sloping sides embedded into a crystal base and the face of a lion, a pair of translucent wings rising at either side. It’s heavy, which serves only to curb _ some _ of his cravings. Ostentatious too. The stopper has a cluster of gold at the base, a bulbous quartz knot, and a two-level dome formed in a thin sheet of gold. 

Venetian. Or, at least, that’s what Happy said when Tony showed him the catalogue (no prices on show, obviously, Happy gets anxious at prices). They’d been on the couch, the only thing that had been in the tower other than extra floor trimmings and dust. Happy was on one end and Tony took up the other three quarters, leaning obnoxiously into his space with the catalogue, open on page twenty-two.

(‘It’s crystal and quartz, Tony. With the peak of San Marco’s. That’s classy. That’s _ refined.’_)

Tony had looked at it, tilted his head side to side, figured, what the heck, and now here it is. On the scratched surface of his bar as a child roams free in his apartment.

He sighs. The whisky is fine. Some blend or other he received as a gift probably, but it’s warm and smooth. He sips at it lightly, finds himself heading back to the couch. Where the kid is. 

By the time he sits down, with a slow exhale and a loving sip to his drink, the kid is tearing back Pepper’s heavy blanket, revealing a bag that Tony has never seen in his life. 

It’s a backpack, grey and black panels, white piping and a silver-faced buckle. The decorative panels are radish-red with inky black piping, humped over in smooth plastic, forming a spider’s web and a stylised spider offset against the centre. 

Weird bag for a kid, and ony notes, and nothing remotely Ironman-ish other than the colour scheme. 

The kid heads straight to the front pocket, briefly rubbing one of the spider’s plastic legs before opening the zipper.

He pulls out a dummy with pale red fronting around the teat. It goes straight into his mouth, and he glances down, pulling down a fistful of his sweater as he tries to attach the matching red clipper.

“Aren’t you too old for that?” Tony asks over the rim of his glass. The kid isn’t having too much success with the clip, but Tony’s eyes are glued on the dangling chain of rounded wooden blocks connecting the pacifier to it. On one edge of each block is a shallowly carved letter.

“No,” the kid says. _ M. A. _He pulls his sweater harder, chin dimpling with the baby fat rounding it out. “I can has it.” 

_ I. M._

Tony leans forward to twist the other blocks towards him. “Really,” he hums, distracted. “Who says?” 

_ L._

“Mommy,” the kid replies, blustery around the rubber teat. _ I. A. _ “She says I can ‘till I don’t like it again.” 

“Max,” Tony blurts, almost unbidden. Almost like he didn’t mean to. _Maximilian_. 

The kid_—_Max_— _looks at him, long lashes forming shadows above the thin skin under his eyes. Their gazes meet.

“Daddy,” he says.

-

From inside the rucksack, Max pulls out a quilted blanket in patches of pale yellows and blues. He wraps it around himself haphazardly, all folded over itself, before migrating over to the far side of the soft dumpster couch, where Pepper’s favourite blanket is.

There, he bats away the tastefully decorative pillows with vigour.

“Making yourself at home?” Tony asks, he’s mostly given up. Just in life, in general.

“Yeah,” the kid huffs, reaching as far as he can over the seat. He hooks his hand in the gap and springs off of his short legs, climbing up with a roll and a grunt around his pacifier. “I’m napping now.”

Tony watches him carefully. How he slaps a rogue pillow into shape, sinks down into Pepper’s blanket and fists his own to his face, rubbing the material over his cheek.

“Na-night, Daddy,” he whispers, closing his eyes, without a care that he’s turned a whole life upside down. Nor that the sun is peeking out from behind the clouds. Must be nice, Tony thinks.

Once Max is settled, he squirms and squirms and squirms until he falls asleep. It happens fast, all of a sudden the apartment is devoid of movement. The kid is quiet. Comfortable, like he’s done this a million times. Except, he’s never been in this apartment before.

Tony downs the remaining dregs of liquor and places his glass next to the empty tumbler. 

He waits a moment more—unsure if he’s checking whether Max is really asleep or whether the world has imploded in the past hour or so.

The bag sits between them, large and yet comically insignificant. Tony sneaks another look at the sleep-lax face peeking between the rough threads of a well-loved blanket. He makes a snap decision, snatching the bag and making his way past the fancy cotton couches (that they never actually sit on unless they have company) to the kitchen.

It’s more of a kitchenette, really. Small, despite the grandness of the apartment—but it’s enough for Tony to move around, make a French omelet if he’s feeling spicy.

There’s a granite countertop that doubles as an eating nook, four high stools tucked beneath the outward-facing side. Tony manoeuvres himself behind it, keeping an eye on the kid. 

He unzips each compartment of the bag, taking out its contents to lay neatly on the countertop: there’s a plastic sippy cup in yellow, a small bowl and spoon set, diapers and pull-ups, clothes that have been folded and then rolled (a blue raincoat, pyjamas printed with cartoon boats, soft cotton sweatpants with elasticated leg holes, three pairs of socks, a pair of summer shorts, and three different t-shirts). There’s also a plastic container with a brightly coloured toothbrush and matching toothpaste, an easy-read copy of _ The Little Engine That Could _ that’s falling apart at the seams, frayed brown cardboard stark amongst the brightly coloured pages. 

The last thing inside the bag, tucked away in a slim pocket attached to the back interior wall, is a palm-sized hardcover copy of _ The Little Prince. _ Tony glances up into the living room, where the kid is still sprawled on the couch, arm dangling over the side. He suckles and the pacifier wiggles.

Looking back down to his hands, Tony notices that the book bulges, not laying quite flat. Slipped inside is a standard American passport. He finds the principal page, sees the image of the kid propped against a white wall. He’s looking over the edge of the camera instead of centre, and there’s a hint of a smile, teeth peeking out. 

Printed amongst the standard information, in no-nonsense sans-serif is his name: MAXIMILIAN MICHAIL NOVA STARK.

Tony feels like his skin is vibrating, he needs to think. He cannot, _ will _ not, be part of whatever TMZ-worthy extortion scheme this is. He puts his hand to his face, fingers digging into skin. Eyes screwed shut, he takes a deep breath. It’s not calming, but it was worth a shot. 

When he opens his eyes, the kid is still there, his things are still there, his passport—Tony squints, reads the date of birth more closely, 13 August 801. _801._ But that’s what it says, eight zero one. That doesn’t make any sense, but then again, Tony feels like he’s currently living through a concussion-induced fever so there’s that.

He buries his hands in his hair and hangs his head. A long moment passes. 

“If I may, sir,” J.A.R.V.I.S. says, waiting until Tony lifts his head. “After taking some preliminary heat signatures, there is nothing abnormal in what Master Maximilian reads compared to known human children—”

_ “Master Ma—?” _

_ “_Yes, sir,” says J.A.R.V.I.S. “He appears to be fully human. Though nothing more can be said without extensive tests. Those are beyond my remit.” 

Tony sighs, resisting the temptation to return to his initial position. He didn’t really think it was a possibility that the kid was not human—just, _ how _ is he here?

“Thanks, J.A.R.V.I.S.” 

Tony picks up the passport again, closing it tightly. He sees a slither of white between the pages. It’s a ripped off slip of paper, with the same boring background design of the StarkIndustries notepads they furnish the conference rooms with one side, there are furious circular scribbles, gaps in between the ink—like someone was trying to get the pen to work.

He turns it around, stomach dissolving into cold apprehension as he sees, there in his own rushed handwriting:

_ Everything you need to know is in the place you want to get rid of, but he wants to hold on to. I’m sorry I can’t be more help, please keep him safe — TS _

-

Tony doesn’t know how long he spends staring at the paper. He can’t startle himself out of the blood rushing in his brain, as he tries to _ think. _

“Miss Potts, sir,” Jarvis reminds him.

“ETA?” 

There’s a pause. “Approximately fifteen seconds.”

Tony jolts, clattering his way to the door, he crashes into the jamb, smarting his wedding band against his knuckle at the same time his knee collides with the wall.

_ “Ow, shit,” _ he curses, muffling a yell behind locked teeth, and limps towards the flush of white light above the elevator. “Thanks for the warning_.” _

“Sir, I’m quite sure if you exercised a little more—”

“—I’m selling you to _ TikTok, _you—”

“—precise directions in the future—”

“—then don’t come crying to me_—Pepper!” _

Pepper looks resplendent in egg-shell white, hair slightly matted around her ponytail. She looks tired and perplexed, but also like she’s already broken down at least three of the multiple layers of CEO Virginia Potts. 

(“Potts-Stark,” Tony had mused, doing a bad job of pretending not to be sneaking glances at her. They were picking wedding flowers at a Hollywood boutique. 

Pepper, smiling absently as she poked at a stray white bud in the tester arrangement, hadn’t even spared him a look.“No.”)

“Tony,” she says now. He smiles at her—dopey eyed, hopeless—and then a soft smile touches her own lips. Like she just can’t help herself. But there’s a nervous laugh too. “Are you alright?” 

“Better,” he shrugs, swooping in to the elevator to press a warm kiss to her mouth. It’s quick, barely enough time for her to react. He grabs her carry-on by the handle and her arm and all but drags her out into the apartment. 

It’s solidly light outside now, the day yawning towards 8AM. But the windows in the sitting room are tinted a shade darker, so Max isn’t too disturbed.

“What’s the rush?” she asks, teetering forward on her stilettos. Though she manages to stop them just inside, Tony blocking her view into the wider open space behind him. 

“Thought you’d wanna sleep,” he says, releasing her arm. He scratches at his nose, the carry-on is surprisingly heavy. “The bedroom is that way. There. Where you’ll be sleeping.” 

“Sleeping?”

“Yeah.” 

Pepper’s brown mascara is starting to smudge around her eyes, her foundation breaking up around the edges of her mouth. She pushes her tongue into her cheek. “Huh.”

“What?”

“Nothing, just…” she smiles, sly, “not what I thought you were gonna say.”

Warmth bubbles in his stomach, and even though he doesn’t altogether mean it, he says, “Well, if you’re up—”

“Too late,” Pepper cuts in, she shakes her head. “I’m tired.” 

“You look it,” Tony says, mostly before he’s processed the words.

She exhales on a disbelieving laugh, “Are you saying I look haggard?”

“Yes,” he immediately replies. “But, honey, I _ love _ you for it.” 

She laughs, eyes crinkling at the corners. 

“Well,” she says after, voice fond, “if it’s okay with you, I’d like to keep my ankles intact.” She puts a hand on his arm and leans down, undoing the corded straps of her shoe. 

Her bag is slipping off her shoulder, its shingled leather panels catch the low light with a reddish tint, the unfastened horseshoe buckle flaps against the main body. “They don’t grow back, you know…”

Tony feels more than sees when stills. When he glances down at her, adjusting his grip on the carry-on, she’s looking at the two whisky tumblers on the low coffee table, the one in front of their casual couch.

Her gaze travels up as she slips off her left shoe, catching on the kid nestled in blankets. She frowns, intrigued, before she turns to Tony, “Who—?”

Now, here’s where Tony goes wrong. He presses his lips together, doesn’t say anything. Mostly because his tongue is petrified in the cavern of his mouth.

And Pepper always reads him like a book, like—, like he’s a goddamn manual for _ Hopeless Husbands and How to Solve Them. _ She _ sees _ something in his face and stops. 

When she stands up, height askew with one barefoot on the ground, she lets her arm fall from where Tony is standing stiff. 

Her gaze flickers over his face, seeing the fear and the redness in his eyes. Then she speaks, voice flat. “Tell me this doesn’t mean what I think it means, Tony.” 

It’s so quiet that he can hear the relentless humming of the refrigerator, the early morning call of Manhattan’s pigeon population and, if he strains his ears, the soft rustling of Max sleeping.

“Pepper,” he says, he bites down on the inside of his cheek. “I can’t.” 

She exhales, slow, and shifts to pull her falling bag back on to her shoulder. “Is it yours?” 

And Tony’s mouth slips open to answer her, but then he pauses, debate raging in his thoughts. He takes a shallow breath. 

“He,” he corrects gently, relieved to see a flutter of surprise in her eyes, but no more anger. “I don’t know. I don’t even know how he _ got _ here—but he calls me, he calls me—.” 

Pepper is looking over at the kid, gaze taking in every feature of his sleeping face like gulps of air.

In the silence, he says, “I’m sorry,” and watches how she turns glassy eyes on him. He can’t figure out whether she’s angry or just tired.

“I need to shower,” she tells him hoarsely. A sigh rolls through her body. She leans down, taking off her other shoe with jerking hands. 

When she turns to go towards the staircase, Tony panics, grabbing her by the hand. He squeezes her slim fingers between his own, until that Harry Winston rock is digging into his palm. 

“Please, don’t go, Pep,” he urges, desperately. “I don’t know what to _ do.” _

Her features soften, fingertips just briefly curling over his. But then her eyebrows pinch together and she pulls her hand away. “I’m going to get changed, Tony,” she tells him. “Take a shower, think a little bit. I’ll_, _ I’ll come back. Then, we can figure it out.”

“Together?”

Another deep breath, and her voice seems like it’s coming from the very core of her, thick and transparent. 

“I want breakfast,” she replies instead, powering through the wobble in her voice, stilettos dangling by her fingers. She looks at the kid, can’t seem to tear her gaze away. “And a large cortado. A _ strong _ cortado with, with—like, three ristrettos.”

The knot in Tony’s chest loosens a little, “That’s a lot, honey.”

She doesn’t laugh. Her lips press together. “Yes,” Pepper says, looking back at him at last. “It is a lot.” She pauses, right before she leaves_. “_Make it four ristrettos.”

-

**Author's Note:**

> 🤍


End file.
